Thursday, September 18, 2008

that's just stuff and nonsense: automated fun of the day. 9-18-2008.

I finished this month's Autowin Book Club selection Lying, by Lauren Slater, last week. Some parts made my stomach hurt, some parts were brilliant, some parts made me angry/violent/conflicted. I found it personally compelling on many levels (writer, storyteller, friend, sanity). We'll talk about it on Monday September 22nd, 'cause Allie says talking about literature isn't fun on the weekends, but seems (relatively) fun when confronted with the slings and arrows of ordinary work on Monday morning. Does that work for everyone? I hope so, 'cause you know how RuPaul feels about working. [see photo, left]

Coincidentally, the 22nd is the day before my 5,560th birthday. On the 23rd I'll be moving into a nursing home to eat canned peaches w/cottage cheese and moan about how I could've been a famous writer of famous bestselling novels if I'd just really wanted it more. We can watch Cocoon and Fried Green Tomatoes and talk about kids these days while scratching our wigs, and if any of my "friends" at the "home" say "You look awfully young for a geriatric!" then I'll just spit pudding in their face and say, "Well, now you taste like pudding." And that'll be the end of that conversation.

Speaking of being a senior citizen, Natalie and I caught the early bird special 4:30 show of "Bedbugs" at the New York Musical Theater Festival Wednesday afternoon, starring Alex Vega on drums and a bunch of actors and actresses playing all the other non-drum-related parts, e.g., singing the songs, performing lines, dancing. It's like an 80's glam rock musical green glittery homosexy spectacular of synthy poppy loveliness. Go see it.

Also, a brief Autowin PSA ... bitch magazine is gonna go under if they don't raise $45,000 by October 15th. I don't know if you read it, but I'm gonna be really depressed if it goes under, please do what you can to help. As you're probs aware, if I jump off the roof of The Olive Garden Times Square I will no longer be able to blog, 'cause I'll have no arms and therefore no fingers and how can I type or be a practicing homosexual without fingers? Exactly.



quote: "In real life, every day you might come to a new conclusion about yourself and about the reasoning behind your behavior, and you can tell yourself that this knowledge will make all the difference. But in all likelihood, you're going to keep doing the same old things. You'll still be the same person. You'll still cling to your destructive, debilitating habits because your emotional tie to them is so strong--so much stronger than any dime-store insight you might come up with--that the stupid things you do are really the only things you've got that keep you centered and connected." (Elizabeth Wurtzel, Now More Again)
links:
1. it makes me sad that someone so talented and so brilliant is no longer with us and will not be writing any more words or footnotes again. it makes me sad that the world was too much, or not enough, or just was, I guess, for someone the world needed -- needs -- so much, and especially now.
-R.I.P David Foster Wallace (@n+1)
-in his honour, playboy has reprinted david foster wallace's first piece of fiction: Late Night (@playboy)
2. publishing: once doomed, now fucked. the end of book publishing in america. (@nymag)
3. "the income for top people in a wide variety of occupations that do not require a college degree is higher than the average income for many occupations that require a b.a.": are too many people going to college?(@the american)
4. america's next top model recap: pee up or shut up (@fourfour)
5. haviland. once again I am posting a link that links to the Sarah Palin vlogs. if you miss this one too, we're not friends anymore.: Sara Benicasa as Sarah Palin (@lustylady)
6. how people read on the web - like dumbshits. online literacy is a lesser kind. (@the chronicle of higher ed.)
7. babar! freeing the elephants (@the new yorker)
8. nerve does the 50 buzziest blog posts of all time, which includes this incredible look at the photoshopping of faith hill's redbook cover i must've missed the first time around, like before i realized jezebel was awesome. amazingly enough, my fight with that woman was not on the list. (@nerve)
9. this is why i left sarah lawrence: reforming the requirement-free curriculum (@inside higher ed)
10. You are forcing me to remember when all I want is to just forget you. (@achtung baby)
11. laramie given an epilogue a decade later. (@nytimes)
12. Lindsay Lohan and the New Definition of "Out" (@after ellen)

14 comments:

Anonymous said...

ahhhhhh! first! moooooooo!

Anonymous said...

also, yes, i agree with your PSA, Bernie. everyone should buy a subscription of bitch and overpay for it! seriously, kids, we need this publication-now more than ever.

autumn m said...

i love the movie fried green tomatoes! it rocks

Anonymous said...

Love = stuff and nonsense
Future = vodka

Anonymous500

eric mathew said...

I thought that girl was Hav for a second... okay just woke up.. anyway... Sarah B's vlogs are amazing. just like way to funny and Laramie is brilliant. You must go to their blog and read the entries... it;s crazy how real it is. ugh i have to go finish packing. my suitcases are going to cost like an extra $3000 ugh.

Anonymous said...

Thanks for the link boo! This is how I know that you meant it when you said the show was good.

I haven't gotten to any auto-fun links as of yet... I've been busy sending out auto-zines and gear like its my job! xo!

Haviland said...

first of all, i kinda thought that girl was me, too...i was thinking, "when did i do that shoot? that looks like it was fun! collaging with big hair!" hm.

ok, srsly LOVE the sarah warn article today about Lohan. This is exactly what I've always wanted as far as "human rights" and "coming out." Are we magically getting to the point where we no longer HAVE to publically make a grand statement about our orientation? That IS magically delicious. Go Linds.

And I saw the Palin stuff. Thank you Riesling.

Vote For the O!

riese said...

NARRRRR hiii!!! moo mickie moo mickie moo moo moo!

rabeeey: your name is natalie and you endorse this message, is what you're saying.

autumn m: well that means i've got good times in store at the nursing home!

anonymous 500: I love the future.

eric mathew: I know right, because hav can do her hair like that too. If only I looked like her friend, then we could do a parody of the sarah palin vlog parody which would be amazing.

a;ex: it is your job 'cause your job is doing what i tell you to do obvs. good thing you're sending those out or tinkerbell would've attacked yo later just saying.

haviland: yay sarah warn! dear sarah warn, give me a paying job love riese. hi!! i agree about the magical point ... i feel like we'll not be all the way there until there's a nationwide agreement that heterosexuality is never the assumed norm, there's no implicit hetero-hood anymore. when that day comes, i will marry brad pitt. jk. i'll marry jenny shimizu.

Anonymous said...

ok, I know I'm behind on this, but I'm officially obsessed with Samanthan Ronson and Lindsay Lohan.

That was a great article... it made me think of the convo I had with my co-worker where he was calling Lindsay's bluff cause he didnt believe she was a real lesbian. He believes she's w/Ronson for attention and that she'll eventually go back to men.

Like, really?
I have a lot of feelings about that obviously.

Mercury said...

The only good thing Sarah Palin ever did besides being a woman in politics was when she gave us all money. Like they were fighting over what to do with it and she decided to make PFD's bigger. We got $3,269 each just for living here. So basically she literally bought Alaska's affections.

Seriously, that woman is not only in the Anchorage Daily News every day. She's in the Anchorage Daily News in three or four stories every day. Her picture is not only always on the front. It's on the front, and the side, and the back, and inside.

Alaskans have bumper stickers and buttons that say "Go Sarah! We love our Gov." These people make it rather painful for me to venture out into society.

Anonymous said...

you still need practice at being a homosexual?

Anonymous said...

I don't know how I missed that Inside Higher Ed piece on Brown's curriculum reform; thank you for sharing the linkage! It's funny that this is why you left Sarah Lawrence; for the first two months I was at SLC, I spent most of my free time preparing transfer applications to other colleges (Brown, Swarthmore, Middlebury, etc.) for the same reasons. I don't know what kept me from actually sending them, or why I actually ended up staying, but for some reason the "freestyle" curriculum ended up being rather good for me, I think, whereas it certainly did not agree with others.

Also I FRICKIN' LOVE your new blog banner; it is 85,000 levels of way wicked awesome! Also I am sorry I cannot participate in the Lying discussion because my life is requiring too much attention. [cries, whines, etc.]

riese said...

a;ex: I am going to be reeally upset if they break up and L-Lo goes back to men. I'm cringing praying that moment won't come. Anyhow I don't think she's doing it for attention, you need to smack your co-worker over the head and tell him those close to the pink mafia have known about l-lo's bisexuality/lesbianism for ages.

mercury: I love that she bought Alaska. Did i already say how I keep telling people how you told me a horrid story about Palin like when we had dinner adn even though I can't remember it, when she was nominated I was like, I've heard something bad about her I just don't remember exactly what it is right now.

That's a good reason to stay indoors, if you needed one.

daveycakes: it's not practice, it's gametime.

atherton: Yeah that was sort of an excuse, there's a lot of reasons why I left. But I didn't like that, it made my education feel even more pointless than it ended up being. But yeah I felt like everyone was wanting to transfer, filling out transfer apps, though when I went to U-Mich i felt like everyone there was ready to transfer too. But I left after first semester which actually made me inelgibile to transfer to where I wanted to transfer to (NYU). I did an independent study while I was living int he city having debauchery. In retrospect, I can't believe they gave me 5 credits to do almost nothing besides work at the olive garden.

Semicolon made the new blog banner ... yay for loving it!

cao said...

just finished lying...so ready for bookclub.